Time, Place, and Manner

For the first time in perhaps all of history, an elected official in Chicago has resigned from office without a criminal investigation. We'd say to break out the bubbly, but you might need to save that for the Bears. So, just give yourselves a pat on the back, Chicago. It's looking like a good year.

Cook County Judge Susan McDunn didn't step down from office because she'd been caught accepting bribes or trying to sell a vacant Senate seat or sexually harassing her underlings. Nope, she resigned her post because she's cray-cray.

McDunn claims that for the past 20 years, since she won a contested election, she's been persecuted by her political opponents and, of course, the Catholic Church. Because what's a persecution complex without thinking the Pope is out to get you? Well, the Chicago Archdiocese, but you just know the Pope is in on it too.

Of course, it's not really that odd for someone in an elected office to think people are out to get you. It's probably actually true. It's sort of how American democracy works. But that's not where McDunn's paranoia ended.

She also believed that someone, perhaps her lawyer, perhaps her doctor, or perhaps her spiritual adviser, had filed cases under seal in her name. Now, you don't have to be a civil procedure wiz to figure out that this doesn't really ever happen. Courts generally frown on people filing lawsuits in other people's names. But that's why it's under seal, so the judge can't ask her if she's really filing these cases.

McDunn enlisted the help of a federal judge who looked in to the matter and found that no such cases existed. And so you know what that means? That McDunn is just nutters? Nooo. That the case is under super double secret seal that's hidden from even Chicago's top federal judge. Spooky. With any luck though, the case isn't filed in the name of Susan McDunn, but SUSAN MCDUNN, the corporate simulacrum created at birth by the Federal Government.

While it's rather tragic to see someone break down under the pressures of public office, it's still nice to see a Chicago official step down voluntarily rather than being led out in handcuffs. And that's effing golden.